Musicians draw inspiration from many places, and when you’re as gifted as Taylor Swift, that inspiration can come from just about anywhere—even the football field. Ever since she began dating Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, Tay-Tay has been weaving more sports metaphors and references into her music. Her latest album, The Tortured Poets Department, is a prime example.
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Take her tracks “Alchemy” and “So High School” from the album. In “Alchemy,” she references touchdowns, trophies, celebrations, and beer. In “So High School,” she mentions practices and ball imagery pulled straight from the locker room and stadiums.
” So when I touch down / Call the amateurs and cut ’em from the team / Ditch the clowns, get the crown. Shirts off and your friends lift you up over their heads / Beer stickin’ to the floor, cheers chanted ’cause they said. There was no chance trying to be the greatest in the league. Where’s the trophy? He just comes runnin’ over to me.”
But as per US Magazine, long before her relationship with Kelce, Taylor had already started incorporating sports language into her lyrics. “In your life you’ll do things, Greater than dating the boy on the football team, I didn’t know it at fifteen,” she sang in her song ‘Fifteen.’
Another notable example is “Only the Young,” a politically charged anthem that Taylor Swift featured in her Netflix documentary Miss Americana. In the song, she tackles the 2018 U.S. midterm elections, promotes youth empowerment, and calls out gun violence, while also taking a jab at Donald Trump. She uses sports metaphors to make her point, singing, “the game was rigged, the ref got tricked,” cleverly blending political commentary with athletic verbiage.
Sports references have consistently found their way into her songwriting. In “Willow,” a love song from her 2020 album Evermore, Taylor compares her feelings to winning a trophy or a championship ring, symbols of ultimate achievement in American sports like the NFL or NBA. It’s a powerful metaphor for desire and devotion.
“As if you were a mythical thing. Like you were a trophy or a champion ring. And there was one prize I’d cheat to win.”
The image becomes even more vivid when you think of her standing on the field, watching Travis Kelce hoist the Lombardi Trophy and wear his Super Bowl ring, moments she shared in real life with him. Before that, though, she was singing “You belong with me” for her crush on the high school football team in the music video for her song with the same name.
Some more sports references in Swift’s music
Then there’s “London Boy” from her Lover album, a track inspired by her time with ex-boyfriend Joe Alwyn. The lyrics casually reference her introduction to rugby, a sport she picked up watching during their time together in the UK.
“And now I love high tea, stories from uni, and the West End. You can find me in the pub, we are watching rugby with his school friends.”
In her song “Mean” from the album Speak Now, Taylor Swift fires back at the critics who came after her, following a 2010 performance with Stevie Nicks. The two shared the stage for a medley that included Swift’s songs “Today Was a Fairytale” and “You Belong With Me,” along with Fleetwood Mac’s “Rhiannon.” It wasn’t her strongest showing, and the media quickly pounced on the then 19-year-old, questioning her vocal ability.
Swift channeled that backlash into “Mean,” where she paints a biting portrait of those critics. She describes them as bitter loudmouths who, in the future, will do nothing more than sit at a bar, drink, watch football, and rant obnoxiously about how she can’t sing—opinions no one will care to hear, yet they’ll keep shouting anyway.
“And I can see you years from now in a bar talkin’ over a football game. With that same big loud opinion, but nobody’s listening. Washed up and ranting about the same old bitter things. Drunk and grumbling on about how I can’t sing.”
These are a few examples of how sports and her personal life continue to shape Taylor Swift’s songwriting in both subtle and overt ways. Going forward, we can expect even more sports references and jargon to find their way into her lyrics. And as long as she’s dating Travis Kelce, football will likely take center stage.
Kelce has already found himself immortalized in her music, most notably when she tweaked the lyrics of her song “Karma” during a live performance to sing, “Karma is the guy on the Chiefs, coming straight home to me.”
